Should You Forget Everything You've Ever Heard About Breakfast and Weight Loss?

A new study suggests the "most important meal of the day" may not be that important for weight loss after all.

Should You Forget Everything You've Ever Heard About Breakfast and Weight Loss?A new study suggests the "most important meal of the day" may not be that important for weight loss after all.

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It's the first rule of weight loss: Eat breakfast every single day. But a new study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that dieters who skipped breakfast lost just as much weight as dieters who ate the meal.

Researchers split 309 adults who wanted to lose weight into three groups: One that was instructed to eat breakfast every day before 10 a.m., one that was told to avoid consuming anything but water until 11 a.m., and one control group that was told to eat healthily but wasn't given any breakfast-specific instructions. After 16 weeks, all three groups had lost the same amount of weight.

However, the findings aren't as simple as "breakfast doesn't impact weight loss." Why? Well, for starters, the participants chose what they ate every day. And if they were starting their days with high-sugar cereals, well, that might be why their breakfast wasn't helping them lose. In fact, a recent study in Appetite found that high-carb, low-fat breakfasts could cause weight gain, not loss. And another recent study from Biofortis Clinical Research and the University of Missouri found that high-protein breakfast eaters reported feeling less hunger, more satiety, and less desire to eat throughout the day—even eating fewer calories at lunch compared to people with low-protein breakfasts. Basically, eating breakfast isn't enough. You also have to eat the right breakfast.

What's more, the study researchers didn't measure participants' appetite, body fat, or metabolism, which previous research has shown breakfast eating may affect. And the study only lasted for 16 weeks—who knows what would have happened if the study kept going?

"This is an example of a very poorly done study," says Kimberly Gomer, R.D., director of nutrition at the Pritikin Longevity Center. "There were too many missing factors, so I would tell people to basically ignore it."

"When someone skips breakfast, they generally allow themselves to get too hungry—and then they may reach for unhealthy, convenient processed foods," says Gomer. "So the idea that a scheduled breakfast to prevent that is thought to be the solution. However, if you are not truly hungry at breakfast, you don't really know what will make you full and satisfied. You are eating to simply follow a diet or rule, which is counterproductive to health."

Instead, focus on having healthy foods—from first-thing-in-the-morning breakfast options to mid-morning snacks—readily available. That way, you can eat something smart when you start to get hungry and never hit that ravenous, I-could-eat-everything-in-sight point.